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REMARKS OF WILLIAM H. SEWARD, 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, JUNE, 1856, 

Concerning Kansas and the Constitutional Free- 
dom of Debate. 



UNITED STATES SENATE, 

JuxE 16, 1856. 

Debate on the Priating of the Resolutions of the 

Legislature of Rhode Island, concerning the 

Assault upon the Hon. Charles Sumner. 

. Mr. SEWARD. I deem it to be my duty, under 
the circumstances, to move that these resolutions 
be printed. 

There Is no man, in this House or elsewhere, 
Mr. President, who holds to a higher stauda^d 
of parliamentary and senatorial propriety, cour- 
tesy, and comity, than myself. I acknowledge 
that it is the duty of every member of the Senate 
to confine himself within the well-known rules of 
parliamentary debate. I hold that it is the duty 
of the Senate of the United States to maintain 
even a higher standard of propriety and deco- 
rum and mutual respect amongst its members, 
than any rules which prevail in any mere 
parliamentary assembly in the world prescribe. 
I find among free Governments no parliamentary 
body that corresponds to my conception of the 
august character of the American Senate. It is 
a parliamentary body only in one respect — it 
debates, and frames, and enacts, laws ; but the 
members who compose it are not representatives 
of municipalities, classes, or orders, but repre- 
sentatives of sovereign States. Practically, they 
are ambassadors sent by their several States. 
The States are equal nations, and their repre- 
sentatives here are equal in dignity and in au- 
thority. The dignity, the courtesy, and the pro- 
priety, which ouglit to prevail here, are the dignity, 
courtesy, and propriety, which would be exjjected 
to be observed and maintained in a Congress of 
separate sovereign States or Nations. This being 
so, I am sure no one will suppose that it is mj' 
f)urpose now, or at any other time, to seek to 
lower the standard which is insisted upon by the 
Senators around me. 

But, sir, I differ widelyfrom my honorable friend 
from Mississpipi [Mr. Brow.v] about the manner in 
which the observance of senatorial courtesy and 
propriety is to be enforced. It is not the rights 
of individual members of the Senate that are 
involved ; it is the rights of the States, the Nations 
represented here, that are concerned. We are 
not merely persons; we are not here in our indi- 
vidual characters ; we are the representatives of 
States; and whenever we forget the real presence 
of those States in this their great diplomatic 
council, and introduce here ourselves, our own 
interests, our own rights, and our own wishes, 
our own vanities, and our own ambitions, we 
make- as great a mistake as the tragedian who 
betrays an individual or personal grief or joy in 



the performance of the drama which he is en- 
acting. 

Speaking, as every member here does speak, for 
his State, in her name, and as the organ of her 
opinions and her will, there are two guarantees 
that he will observe the proprieties of the place. 
The first is— and the Senate relies upon it — that 
every representative will, of himself, from the 
dictates of his own judgment and good sense, 
confine himself within those rules which the 
standard of the Senate prescribes. If he fails to 
do this, the Constitution provides a further secu- 
rity — and that is, that the Senate may punish him 
for disorderly conduct; and even whether his 
deportment amounts to what constitutes disorder- 
ly conduct or not, the Senate can expel him. 
Though he be an ambassador from a sovereign 
State, and responsible to that State, he is also 
responsible to his peers assembled there. They 
can degrade him, and expel him from the high 
presence which he disgraces, and call upon the 
State he represents to send another representa- 
tive, worthy of that presence, and worthier of 
herself. 

What other guarantees than these do you want? 
The Constitution intrusts to the Senate the power 
and the responsibility of punishing infractions of 
parliamentary rules of debate, or any other 
offences committed within the Senate Chamber. 
That was one of the objects of the Constitution., 
Another object was to protect, and all agree that ' 
it does effectually protect, a Senator from responsi- 
bility anywhere else for the manner in which he 
discharges his high trust. He is responsible to 
the Senate, even to the whole extent of a forfeiture 
of the trust which he holds; and the Constitution 
declares that he shall be responsible in no other 
way, and to no other authority or power than 
the Senate itself. 

All Senators agree that he is responsible no- 
where else, by virtue of any legal remedy or pro- 
cess. I cannot comprehend the reasoning which, 
while it admits that the Constitution secures to a 
Senator absolute impunity from legal accounta- 
bility for the utterance of his sentiments here, 
insists that the Constitution leaves him, at the 
same time, subjected to punishment which is ir- 
regular and illegal, to be administered according 
to the suggestions of personal caprice or revenge — 
reasoning which, while it declares that no°de- 
partmenc of the Government has a right or a 
power to inquire into an offence committed by 
him here, yet contends that there is power iu 
irresponsible persons and individuals, without 
law, to punish him elsewhere. Sir, it were bet- 
ter to abolish the Constitution at once, if this posi- 
tion is just and true. If we are liable to punish- 



2 



ment at the behest of power outside of the Sen- 
ate, it is best to have that punishment ascertained 
and defined by law, awarded by judges, and exe- 
cuted by responsible agents of the law. 1 under- 
stand the honorable Senator from Mississippi to 
contend that, although, by the Constitution ol the 
United States, the Senator from Massachusetts 
could not be punished in any legal court or tribu- 
nal for what he has said or done here, he never- 
theless could be, and rightfully has been, pun- 
ished in the present instance by private assault 
and violence. By whom, and in what manner, 
has that punishment been inflicted? 

Mr. BROWN. If the Senator from New York 
will allow me, I will state what I meant. He will 
understand me as saying that neither the Sena- 
tor from Massachusetts, nor any other Senator, 
is responsible in a court of justice, as for a libel, 
for anything uttered on this floor ; but he will also 
understand me as taking the ground distinctly, 
that, as a man and as a gentleman, he is respon- 
sible out of doors for what he saj^s here person- 
ally offensive to other people. In other words, if 
I choose, on the floor of the Senate, to olfer to 
the Senator from New York a gross personal in- 
sult, as a man and as a gentleman I am respon- 
sible to him. The Constitution has never under- 
taken to shield me from that responsibility. 
While I say nothing of the conduct of other gen- 
tlemen, I say for myself, that, if I offered such an 
affront, and the Senator demanded of me satis- 
faction, and I undertook to shield myself behind 
the Constitution, all Christendom would say that 
I had acted meanly and cowardly. 

Mr. SEWARD. I do not misunderstand the 
honorable Senator from Mississippi; at all events, 
I am sure I do not intentionally misunderstand 
him. I understand him to say that the State of 
Rhode Island takes alarm unnecessarily and un- 
wisely and unjustly, for the freedom of debate 
in the Senate of the United States, under the cir- 
cumstances presented on this occasion. Those 
circumstances are simply these : that a Senator, 
for words spoken in debate, has been assailed, 
b3aten, and brought to the floor of the Senate 
Cliamber, by the hand of a member of the House 
of Representatives. 

Mr. BROWN. Allow me to say to the Senator, 
that I treat the transaction, which chanced to 
happen in the Senate Chamber, precisely as if it 
had happened anywhere else. I attach no special 
sanctity to this Chamber, e.xcept when the bodj" 
is in session. I prefer, as a mere matter of taste, 
that this transaction should have occurred else- 
where ; but I say, I attach no special importance 
to its happening here. If Mr. Brooks committed 
any outrage upon Mr. Sumner, if his conduct 
Avas cowardly, if he crept upon him and struck 
him unawares, and thereby got the advantage, 
Mr. Sumner yet survives ; he has a right to demand 
personal satisfaction. If he demands it, and Mr. 
Brooks refuses it, I shall then know where to put 
my denunciation. But this, I say again, is a 
matter of controversy between two persons, with 
wliich I think the States of the Union have no 
sort of connection. 

Mr. SEWARD. Mr. President, the States of 
the Union are deeply interested in h.aving their 
rights, their opinions, and their policies, explain- 
ed, defended, and maintalaed, in the Senate of 



the United States, by their representatives. Those 
rights, opinions, and policies, cannot be so ex- 
plained, defended, and maintained, unless those 
representatives are perfectly free and secure in 
their persons, while attending the Congress of 
the United States. Whether they perform their 
duties well or ill, whether they abuse the power 
intrusted to them and the responsibilities with 
which they are invested, or not, the Constitution 
provides a way, and the only way, for ascertain- 
ing and determining. 

This is what I maintain. Now, sir, the Legis- 
lature of the State of Rhode Island has chosen to 
protest against any proceedings of either House 
of Congress, or any consent of Congress, to screen 
an offender who has violated the person of a Sen- 
tor for words spoken in debate. Tue State thus 
speaking, speaks, I think, as becomes a State, 
which values her own rights, and at the same 
time is resolved to uphold and maintain law, or- 
der, and the Constitution, public liberty, and this 
inestimable fabric of civil government. 

However this may be, I do not agree with my 
honorable friend from ^Nlississippi, that it is a 
fair way of meeting this question to oppose the 
printing of these resolutions. Rhode Island, 
though one of the smallest States in the Union, 
is entitled to speak to the Senate of the United 
States with a voice as loud as that of the great- 
est of her thirty sisters. This is the place, of all 
others, where her voice is not to be stifled or de- 
spised. Hitherto It has been held that a State 
in her sovereignty was the judge, the supreme 
judge, of the time, the occasion, the subject, the 
place, the manner, and even the language, with 
which she should address the Senate, the coun- 
cil of all the States. I would not begin a diH"er- 
ent practice at this late day, and especially on a 
question of this kind ; I would not refuse to list- 
en to a State which thus comes remonstrating 
against any wrongful action which she appre- 
hends on the part of the Senate or the Congress 
of the United States. These things take their 
turn. It may not be long before some other State 
comes here, and, with language as earnest, gives 
its voice of approbation to proceedings in the 
Senate of the United States, favored by a ma- 
jority of its members. Some other State, hold- 
ing a different opinion, may perhaps speak in 
language which may be thought too strong to 
be compatible with the respect justly due to this 
assemblage of the whole of the thirty-one States ; 
and yet her position may be such as to make it 
convenient for the Senate to overlook the offence. 
For my part, I like to see the States, all of them, 
always speak out plainly, frankly distinctly, and 
boldly. Not only on this occasion, but on all 
others, I believe that even error and passion may 
be tolerated safely, when reason is left free to 
combat them. Sir, I would not indulge any 
question about the propriety of the language 
with which Rhode Island addresses us on this 
occasion. I say here, and always: 

" Here's a lieahh to hiin that vvoulii rcail ; 

Here's a lieulth to him ihut would write : 
For none ever rear'd that t!ie truth should be told. 

But him whom the truth would indict." 

Mr. BROWN. There is only one point in the 
speech of the Senator from New York on which 
I care to comment. He agrees with me, that Seu- 



} zL 1 L 



s 



ators and Representatives are not to be called to 
account by libel suits for words spoken in de- 
bate ; but he goes further, and takes the ground 
that they are not to be called to account in any 
manner, no odds what they may say. He thinks 
that a Senator may get up here, and oft'er any 
sort of affront which he may choose to offer to a 
brother Senator— may denounce in any manner, 
no matter how broad, a member of the House of 
Representatives — may utter every sort of denun- 
ciation against a private citizen — may belie, libel, 
and traduce,-a sovereign State of this Union ; and 
yet for all this is protected by the Constitution, 
and that to call him to account outside of the 
Senate is a grave offence against the Constitu- 
tion. So I understand the Senator. He nods 
assent. 

Against all that doctrine, I enter here, in the 
American Senate, my most solemn and emphatic 
protest. I am willing that it shall go to the 
country, that, if I offend the Senator from New 
York in debate, I am responsible to him, not as 
a Senator, but as a man and as a gentleman ; I 
am responsible to him out of doors, and the Con- 
stitution has thrown around me no protecti<ou in 
that regard. If I say of any man out of doors, 
who is entitled to be recognised as a gentleman, 
an offensive thing, I am responsible tor having 
said so, in my personal character as a gentleman. 
If I choose to denounce the State of Massachu- 
setts in gross and offensive terms, or the State 
of New York, and one of her citizens calls me to 
account for it, as a man, as a gentleman, I am 
responsible, and the Constitution has given me 
no immunity against such responsibility. The 
Constitution has guarantied to me the right to 
say what 1 choose in this Chamber. Though it 
may be libellous, though it may be grossly scan- 
dalous, though it may be in the highest possible 
degree offensive, I am not to be called to account 
in a court of justice as a Senator for what I say 
here; but the Constitution has given me no 
license to libel " all the world and the rest of 
mankind;" it has not guarantied to me the priv- 
ilege of saying to the Senator from New York 
that he is a black-hearted Abolitionist, or any- 
thing else that may be personally offensive to 
that Senator, and then given me an immunity, a 
protection, a guarantee, against responsibility 
outside of this Chamber. The Constitution, in 
my opinion, has given me no such guarantee ; 
therefore I say, as I did at the outset, Avithout 
meaning to protract this debate, that the Sena- 
tor from New York and myself are pointedly at 
issue as to what are our constitutional rights on 
this floor. 

I mean, as a Senator, so long as I occupy a 
position here, to be responsible out of doors for 
whatever I say — not in any libel suit — I will 
protect myself against that if I choose to do so, 
because that is my constitutional right ; but for 
whatever I say here, as a man, as a citizen, and 
as a gentleman, T will be responsible out of doors. 
I believe the Constitution gives me no protec- 
tion, nor did it ever design to give me protec- 
tion, against such responsibility. If it had un- 
dertaken to do it, the undertaking would be 
futile. 

There is no use in discussing this question. If 
men will give gross personal affronts to others, 



they must be responsible in their own proper 
persons ; and no laws, no constitution, until our 
whole nature is changed, can alter this feeling 
of our common humanity. AVe must either be 
base, beneath the dignity of men, or elevated to 
the dignity of angels, before you can enforce any 
other rule, whether it be in the Constitution, in 
the law, or elsewhere. A person must be less 
than a man, and, from the very nature of his 
degradation, too low to resent a personal affront, 
or else he must be akin to the angels, and 
therefore so much above man that there can be 
no occasion for his resenting personal injuries, 
before you can enforce that rule. The men who 
made the Constitution were human. They were 
like the Senator from New York and myself. 
They never undertook'to debase us below the 
dignity of men, or elevate us to the dignity of 
angels or demi-gods. They regarded us, I con- 
ceive, as mere mortals ; took us as they found us, 
and made a Constitution which suited our con- 
dition as men — I trust, as dignified men. They 
protected us against vexatious suits for libel and 
damages for what, in the discharge.of our duties, 
we choose to say here. They never gave us, in 
my opinion, ati unlimited privilege of libelling all 
the world, and then saying to all the world, 
"Hands off; we are a privileged class; we are 
clothed with the panoply of the Constitution ; 
here we stand, in all our majesty and in all our 
dignity ; we say to you that you are rogues, 
thieves, liars, scoundrels, cowards, and every- 
thing which can make you infamous, and yet wo 
are not responsible, because we are Senators.'' I 
believe no such thing, and will maintain no such 
doctrine, here or elsewhere; and this 1 say, inde- 
pendent of the fracas which occurred on the floor 
of the Senate Chamber— not in the Senate. 

Mr. TOOMBS. I do not intend at this time to 
discuss this question. I shall not oppose the 
printing of these resolutions. I think they are 
entitled to a respectful answer from those gen- 
tlemen of the Senate who differ from them. 
Coming from the source they do, one of the sov- 
ereign States of this Union, they are entitled to, 
and shall receive from me, a respectful consider- 
ation and a reply. I entirely differ with the 
Legislature of Rhode Island, and I shall endeav- 
or ''to maintain that difference. I wish to bo 
heard on a proper occasion. Possibly I had bet- 
ter take an opportunity, when the Massachusetts 
resolutions come up, as they are already before 
the Senate. I desire to be heard in defence of 
the rights of the people against the asserted pre- 
rogative of this body. I deny the right, under 
the Constitution, of one branch of Congress, or 
of both together, to legalize calumny, or to pro- 
tect calumniators. I hold that the Constitution 
has given no such protection. It has not pro- 
tected, nor can it protect, any Senator for a pub- 
lication containing aspersions on the character 
of any man or any conmiunity. 

So far as the Constitution is concerned, I agree 
with the Senator from Mississippi and the Sen- 
ator from New York, that members here are ex- 
empt from suits in the courts of justice, or to be 
inquired of concerning what they say. I also 
admit that in this District, although it is not 
universally the case, to assault a man for any- 
thing is illegal, but not because of that clause o 



the Constitution of the United States to -which 
allusion has been made. It is illegal by the com- 
mon law, which obtains in this District, to make 
an assault. But, sir, this assault^ — and there ha.? 
been much of the art with which this question 
has been managed — is admitted by the ]ierson 
assailed, and by the testimony intmduccd, to 
have been for the printed i-peech. Such is the 
testimony of Mr. Sum.n'er himself. I deny the 
right or authority of the Senate to tolerate or to 
protect any man (whatever may be his constitu- 
tional privileges for his utterances here) in giv- 
ing them to the winds of Heaven, and assailing 
any one's character. 

I shall show that, from the very beginning of 
this Government, and fur at least two hundred 
and fifty years before, in the country from wbich 
we received our institutions, and under which 
this pretence is got up, it has beeri universally 
held that the omnipotence of Parliament itsell 
could not protect the slanderer or the libeller even 
fr^ the courts of justice. If he attempts to 
print, or is authorized to print. Parliament, or 
the Senate, by its own printer, cannotutter any 
libel, or any slander, on any citizen of this great 
country. The Constitution has not given the 
right. Disappointed persons and mistaken State? 
and communities may rage and clamor, hnt the 
right is deeply founded, older than your Govern- 
ment, commencing with the earliest germ of lib- 
erty, and it will survive your GovL-rnment. 

Mr. SEWARD. I shall not anticipate the argu- 
ment of the honorable Senator from Georgia, in 
which I see that, to borrow a technical term from 
the lawyers, he is preparing to new-assign in re- 
gard to this offence committed in the Senate 
Chamber, and to make the provocation of tiie 
offence consist in \\\q printing instead of the speak- 
ing of Mr. Sumner's speech. I shall hear him 
on that, as I always do on every question, with 
great pleasure, and answer him, if necessary, 
with candor and respect. 

la reply to the honorable Senator from Missis- 
sippi, 1 have only this to say: that I did yield 
my assent to his statement of a case, supposed 
by him the strongest which could possildy be 
imagined. It was a case of deliberate, malicious, 
wanton, outrageous, calumnj' and insult, in the 
Senate of the United States, commited by a Sen- 
ator against another Senator. He thinks I am 
wrong in saying that the Constitution of the 
United States, even in such a case, protects the 
offender against responsibility out of the Senate 
Chamber. 

Sir, the Constitution of the United States is 
admitted by that Senator to protect the offender 
from all legal prosecution — from all legal pun- 
ishment to be imposed by all legal tribunals 
whatever except the Senate. Now, if there is 
anything in the Constitution which authorizes 
an illegal person, in an illegal manner, in breach 
of the peace, in the Senate Chaml)or or out of it, 
to inflict a corporal punishment which the Con- 
stitution prohibits from being inflicted in a legal 
manner, then the honorable Senator from Missis- 
sippi will produce it. I can only say that 1 know, 
as rules of conduct in the Senate, but two laws. 
The one is the Constitution, the highest law of 
the land; the other is the law of God, the only 
law which is paramount to that Constitution. I 



am amenable to my country, and to individuals, 
only in so far as the law of the land prescribes. 
1 am amenable to my Cod aloue for the errors 
and oftences committed by me, but not denounc- 
ed by the Constiiution and laws of the land. 
What the law does not punish, what human 
justice fails to punish, Divine justice will ulti- 
mately reach and condemn. But certainly no 
human hand may seize its arrows, or even an- 
ticipate their awful aim. 

But I cannot admit that such cases as the hon- 
orable Senator supposes are to occur here at all. 
His supposition, that Senators will calumniate 
each other, will insult each other, is, with great 
respect to the honorable Senator from Mississip- 
pi, impossible. It is contrary to rea.'ion and to 
the nature of things. This is a high Legislature 
of a highly 'civilized and Christian people — a 
Congress of highly-civilized Christian States. It 
is justly presumed that those who constitute such 
a legislative body, such a Congi-ess, will be gen- 
tlemen, will be Christian men, honorable, chival- 
rous, just, and courteous men, submi.?.sive to 
law, devoted to peace, lovers of order, men of 
truth, passionless and serene in temper, ami ele- 
vated in piirr>oses, aims, and character. 

Mr. BROWN. That is a very good theory, 
but su-[)nose I should get up and say, as has been 
said on the floor of the Senate, that (he Senator 
from New York was incapable of opening his 
mouth witliout utteiing a falsehood, would he 
not consider it personallj'^ offensive? And if be 
c tiled me to account, would he not regard it as 
rather mean if 1 did not give him satisfaction? 

Mr. SEWARD. I do not know anything that 
could be said of the Senator from New York, 
which has not been said of him b^' somebodj' on 
the floor of the Senate of the United States. In 
such a case, the Constitution authorizes me to 
invoke censure and punishment of the offence at 
the hands of the Senate, and it authorizes me to 
seek punishment or revenge nowhere else. In all 
such cases, I have never even called a Senator to 
order. In such a case, I probably never shall, 
and I will explain the reason why. I think it is 
the business of every member on this floor to 
preserve his own dignity, and square his own 
conduct by the rules which regulate the conduct 
of gentlemen. In saying this, I require of him 
to be no more than a sensible, a civil, and a 
well-bred man. I believe all these qualities of 
sense, civility, and good training, enter into the 
character of a gentleman. No one here will con- 
tend that a Senator of the United States ought 
to be less than a gentleman ; that is, a sensilile, 
civil, and well-bred man, to say nothing of abil- 
ity, conscience, and honor, which become the 
Senatorial character. Now, sir, I have a phi- 
losophy on this suViject, which is derived from a 
very excellent essay of an eminent, practical 
moralist, and is expressed in a couplet, imper- 
fectly recollected. That philosophy h.as carried 
me safely though life thus far, and I have "no 
doubt it will carry me safely through to the end. 
It is this : 

" A moral, s'-nsible, and wpll-bred man 
Will II It affront rrie, aiul no ottier uaii.'' 

Mr. President, the honorable Senator from 
North Carolina seems to complain that there is a 
misapprehension, or an attempt, out of this Hall, 



to mis-state tlie unhappy and painful occurrence 
out of wbieli all of this debate has arisen. He 
says he sees nothing sacred in the Hall in which 
our debates are held ; that there is no sanctity, 
no Senatorial presence here, when the life-giving 
debates of the Senate have ceased here with the 
decline of day, and the echoes of our voices have 
fdied away in the arches of the dome tbatstretches 
it3 majestic proportions above our heads. 

The honorable Senator does thereby admit that 
there is a sanctity in the Chamber Avhile we are 
here in our places, and in the actual performance 
of our duties as Senators. Now, if there is a 
sanctity in the Chamber, imparted by the Con- 
stitution, -which just men and patriotic men re- 
spect while we are assembled here, where does 
it rest? Is it to the walls of the Hall itself that 
it attaches, or is it to. our pei'sons, as Senators, 
as representatives of States ? Is it to these stones 
upon which we tread, or to those majestic col- 
umns which uphold the vaulted roofs through 
which our voices reverberate, or is it to those 
roofs themselves ? There is nothing sacred in 
any of these. The sanctity dwells in the persons 
of the Senators — a sanctity not their own, but 
derived from the majesty of the States they rep- 
resent. 

Since our persons are legally sacred while 
standing here and speaking, or while sitting here 
and listening, or voting, during the hours of daily 
session, pray tell me at what time, when we have 
arrived here, or at what time when coming here, 
and at what distance from the Capitol steps, does 
this sanctity attach itself to us? Does it attach 
only when the President announces the session 
opened for the day ? or when we enter the irall? 
or when we ascend the first step of the vestibule 
of the Capitol? Does it descend upon us at the 
Capitol gate, or on the avenue, or when we leave 
the doors of our own dwellings ? It must be that 
it attaches to us somewhere. 

At what time does that sacredness forsake our 
persons, and leave us exposed to assault and 
assassination? Is it when the Chair pronounces 
that the session for the day is closed ? Are we 
then and thenceforth at the mercy of the assas- 
sin or the mob, without constitutional safeguard ? 
Are we not protected by the Constitution if we 
retire with convenient haste from the Senate 
Chamber, when the session is actually closed ? 
Are not our persons sacred until we reach the 
green lawn of the groves that surround the Cap- 
itol? And if we loiter not under the trees on our 
way homeward, are not our persons sacred then ? 
If we do not deviate from the customary track, 
are we not protected by the Constitution of the 
United States even until we reach our dwellings, 
when our own houses become our castles? 

I think it must be admilted, that if there is any 
constitutional security at all attached to our per- 
sons, it is a security which attends us while we 
are going to, remaining at, and returning from 
the Capitol, where our labors are devoted to the 
service of our country, and the preservation of her 
liberty and independence. Then, practically, the 
fact that this violence, although it was committed 
' after the Senate had adjourned, was nevertheless 
committed on a Senator yet remaining in his seat, 
from which he had not removed after the session 
was closed, is precisely the same thing as if it 



had occurred in the Senate when the Senate was 
actually in session. Honorable Senators will find, 
that if ibey seek to except this case from the con- 
stitutional protection which I have invoked, and 
if they shall maintain that one member of the 
House of Representatives can assail in the Senate 
Chamber, within half an hour after the Senate 
has adjourned, one Senator, for words spoken in 
debate, then all the members of the House of 
Representatives may organize themselves into a 
mob, and assault all the Senators, though less 
than a quarter of their own number, for imagined 
offences committed by them all, and waylay and 
attack them in the Hall and in the passages of 
of the Capitol, and in the public streets, with 
constitutional impunity. When occurrences like 
this shall happen, then there will no longer be 
either free government or liberty in the land. 

I am sure, that when honorable Senators come 
to look at the consequences involved in this mat- 
ter, they will at least consider whether it is ex- 
pedient and wise to refuse to hear the States, as 
they are sending up here their deep-toned and 
noble protests. They indicate true pulsations in 
the thirty-one great hearts of the Republic. 

I say now to the honorable Senator from North 
Carolina, with no threat or purpose of intimida- 
tion at all, that if he induces the Senate to sup- 
press the complaint of the State of Rhode Island, 
though she is among the least of the whole ihirty- 
one members of the Confederacy, I shall ask him 
hereafter to remember, when agitation rises higher 
and higher, and its waves shall threaten to over- 
whelm the State, it is not on this side of the 
Chamber that the fault of having produced or 
fomented that so-much-dreaded agitation will be 
found. 

Mr. JAMES rose. 

Mr. WELLER. I desire to move an Execu- 
tive session, as I gave notice some time ago ; but 
I will yield to the Senator from Rhode Island, if 
he desires to make any remarks. 

Mr. BROWN. I first made the objection to 
printing these resolutions. I know what is due 
to the dignity of a sovt reign State; and though 
Rhode Island is the smallest member of the Con- 
federacy, she is equal to any other State, even to 
New York, and I would respect her voice as much. 
I only made the objection, that I might have an 
opportunity of expressing my dissent from the 
resolutions she sent here. I have no purpose to 
prevent their being printed. That courtesy is due 
to Rhode Island, and I readily concede it. 



UNITED STATES SENATE, , 

June 11, 1856. 
The following resolution was submitted by the 
Hon. Mr. Crittenden, of Kentucky : 

Re.iclveil, by the Senate of the United Statu.. That the 
Presideiil be, and is hereliy, reijuesti'd to employ the mil- 
itary s'Tvi<ies oI'Liieuleiiaiit Geiieral Scon in the pauifica- 
tion of Kansas, and in the imineilirtte direution iind <'om- 
maiid o(" all the forces eniployed, or lo he employed, for 
that piirpost-, under .such instructions, and will such au- 
thority and power, as the President can and may think 
proper to g've lo and coiiler upon liitn. 

REMARKS OF MR. SEWARD. 

Mr. President, so long as the question before 
the Senate practically was, whether this reso- 
lution should be taken up for consideration, I 



6 



abstained from participating in the debate, 
becuuse, being favorable to the passage of the 
resolution with the modifications which I sug- 
gested j-esterday, I desired not to defeat so 
important a purpose by manifesting any undue 
zeal or interest in its support. But we have 
already seen that the question upon taking up 
the resolution is virtually a question upon its 
adoption ; and so, with the courtesy and liberality 
which usually prevail in the Senate, the merits of 
the whole resolution itself have been brouglit 
under consideration. I think I foresee, though 
perhaps I may be mistaken in this respect, that 
although a vote to take up the resolution wilF not 
he equivalent to its passage, a vote not to take it 
up will be equivalent to its rejection by the Sen- 
ate. I am unwilling that the subject shall pass 
from the Senate finally, and the resolution be de- 
feated, upon the arguments made in favor of it 
simply by the very able, talented, and venerable 
Senator who introduced it, and the others who 
have sustained it; because all those honorable 
Senators have concurred with those Avho have 
opposed the resolution, in admitting it to be a true 
feature of the troubles, disturbances, and com- 
motions, existing lu Kansas, that the acts of re- 
sistance there are against the laws of the land, 
and that the President of the United States is 
truly engaged in enforcing the laws of the land — 
some honorable Senators say, in enforcing the 
submission of rebels — others say, in suppressing 
and punishing traitors. From all this, my hon- 
orable and venerable friend from Kentucky does 
not dissent. 

So the honorable Senator from Connecticut, 
[Mr. ToucEY,] taking the same view, and agree- 
ing with the honorable Senator from Florida, 
[Mr. Mallory,] says there are courts and there 
are magistrates, and there are ministerial officers, 
in Kansas, to render justice between man and 
man, and compel submission to the laws of the 
land ; and that it is a mere question of executive 
duty, and executive responsibility and power, 
and not a legislative question, which is involved 
in the condition of affairs in Kansas. 

Sir, against all this, I beg leave, most respect- 
fully, in the name of the people of Kansas, and 
in the name of those who maintain the cause of 
the people of Kansas, elsewhere, to protest now, 
henceforth, and forever. Let us come directly 
to the real question which is before the Senate of 
the United States. 

About the seventieth year of the Republic, 
after the commencement of a career of aggrand- 
izement, of conquest, of annexation, of domin- 
ion, such as happened to Rome; such as haj)- 
pened to France ; such as happened to Britain; 
such as has happened to many other empires — 
you have reached a crisis in government of a new 
character, requiring new responsibilities. It is that 
of civil commotion — civil war. I do not say that 
there is civil war in Kansas now. It is a cruel 
refinement to discuss the question whetlicr the 
commotions in Kansas have attained the painful 
eminence of civil war. I do say that towns are 
desolated ; that cities arc burned ; that lives are 
destroyed ; that the law is broken down, if law 
exists there; tJiat life, liberty, and property, are 
unprotected by the civil power; and that a mili- 
tary power to maintain the authority of the United 



States is held in the Territory, for the purpose, 
as it is said, of preventing the incursion of war- 
like and invading parties from an adjoining State 
on the one side, and to compel reluctant aud 
extorted obedience from portions of the citizeus 
of Kansas on the other ; and that hostile parties 
innumerable, various — conflicting in designs, 
purposes, and objects— are engaged in a fearful, 
fratricidal strife, in that new and interesting, but 
most unhappy community. 

If these features of the commotions existing in 
Kansas do not constitute the evil of civil war, it 
is simply because citizens have not yet marshalled 
themselves into the forms of regular opposing and 
conflicting organizations, under the lead of recog- 
nised military authorities. It is manifest, how*, 
ever, that they tend to that issue necessarily! | 
inevitably, and conclusively ; and that issue is 
driven and forced onwards, not merely by the 
events occurring in the Territory itself, but by; , 
the forces of opinion, of interest, of passion, ot 
ambition, operating upon the parties in everjr| 
other Territory, in every other State of the Union, 
in every Legislature of every State of the Union,, 
and manifested throughout the debates and actiod 
of the Congress_ of the United States itself. Sir, 
troops are openly raised in States adjoining Kan- 
sas, and in States remote from Kansas, armed 
organized, and supplied with funds to maintaii 
in Kansas a set of Territorial statutes, which ar« 
resisted by a portion of the people. Such partiei 
have arrived, and are continually arriving, in 
Kansas, with gunpowder, cannon, rifles, and 
balls, and military stores; and they keep the 
pa.^ago open for others coming behi^id. 

It was but a day or two ago, that, in the chiefi 
city of Illinois, funds and men were raised to ra 
sist and put down that foreign party, and wen 
dispatched there to the amount of hundreds o: 
men, and thousands of dollars. It was but the" 
night before last, that, at a meeting in the capital 
commercial city of the Union, five thousand citi- 
zens assembled, and men and money to the num- 
ber of hundreds, and to the value of thousands, 
were provided, subscribed, and paid. Ay, and»| 
the strife grows more intense as it spreads wideMJ 
and wider. The young man forsakes his books ;1 
the lawyer, his place in (he forum ; the clerk, his 
place in the counting-room ; men of all parties, 
and of all ])Ositions, and of all professions, rush 
to this scene — thank God for his blessings, hith 
erto the first, and 1 hope, in the mercy of God, 
the last occasion when civil war shall be immi 
nent in these United States. Ay, sir, the matron 
sends her son with the command to come bac 
with his shield or on it; and the maiden tears 
from her neok the ornaments and embellishments 
which commend her to the love and admiration 
of men, to throw them into the treasury of one 
or the other of these belligerent factions. 

This, sir, call it by what name you please, is j 
the condition of Kansas. Senators say they do 
not know it — they have not been informed of it — 
they have not been officially informed. Sir, are 
we stocks and stones, like dumb idols in the 
Pantheon, that we need the intervention of a. 
priest to inform us of the complaints of our vo> 
taries, and to convey to our dull and artificial 
ears their prayers? You have heard nothing 
else but this, from the day the present Congress 



I- 

•3 1 



assembled until this hour. Senators say that, 
although they have heard it, it does not come in 
an official manner ! Did not two men claiming 
to be representatives of the new, conditional, pro- 
visional 8tate of Kansas, present themselves with 
their petition at your door, three long months 
ago, and ask admission, upon the ground that 
the civil Government which had obtained in 
Kansas was a usurpation and a tyranny which 
was intolerable, and the people there had organ- 
ized themselves into a State, and sent those per- 
sons here to ask you to admit them into the 
Union, as a relief from existing troubles, as a 
redress for existing evils, and a security against 
the otherwise inevitable calamity of civil war? 
■\Vhat else have you been discussing, from the 
beginning of the session to the present time, but 
the question whether you would grant that relief 
and that redress, or whether you would grant 
some other relief and some other redress, to pre- 
vent the calamity of civil war ? 

Do Senators yet say that Congress has no offi- 
cial information on this siibject? Do you not 
knovv — does not every man here know — that a 
person claiming to be a member of Congress has 
applied for admission as a Delegate from the Ter- 
ritory of Kansas, and he has made a case so 
probable, so plausible at least, that the House of 
Representatives have sent a committee of their 
own body, which committee are now, as they have 
been for two mouths past, investigating just this 
simple question, namely, whether Kansas is under 
the dominion of a lawfully-constituted Govern- 
ment, under the organic act of Congress, or 
whether it is under the jurisdiction and power of 
a foreign usurpation and unbearable tyranny? 
That is the simple statement of the case. 

Now, in view of this painful and alarming state 
of things existing in that Territory, it is well to 
consider another matter. We have reached, as 
I have said, the crisis of territorial aggrandize- 
ment, and we are here to meet the responsibili- 
ties of Government in many and remote Territo- 
ries. We are only at the threshold of that new 
experience. We have added territory after ter- 
ritory, dominion after dominion ; and what is 
done by our Government in regard to this, the 
first case of disturbance, ditficulty, and conflict, in 
our Territories, will become the law of the nation 
in regard to other Territories. If you shall, by 
wise legislation now, secure to all the people of 
the new Territories the rights of American citi- 
zens, complete, full, broad, ample as they are en- 
joyed by citizens of the organized States consti- 
tuting this Union, you may expect contentment, 
peace, tranquillity, harmony, prosperity, and ad- 
vancement, in the Territories of the United States. 
But if, on the other hand, you begin now to say 
to the citizens of the United States, who may be 
gathered into a Territory newly opened to them, 
thait they shall submit to tyranny and usurpation, 
of whatever kind; that they shall be disfran- 
chised; that they shall be subjugated, by force, 
to laws which are unjust, unconstitutional, and 
tyrannical, and to Jaws which are founded in 
usurpation — ^then you have reached the time when 
you can expect never more to see peace and har- 
mony prevailing throughout the unorganized or 
only partially organized portions of the Republic. 
The proposition of the honorable Senator from 



Kentucky does not reach the dignity of a remedy 
lor this evil. It is not proposed as such. -Let 
us consider it just exactly in the extent which he 
assigns to it, and which its terms import. This 
great question in Kansas, whether the statutes 'of 
the Territorial Government, so called, shall stand 
and be the law of the land, is one that must be 
decided somewhere, some time, and in' some way. 
How do Senators propose that it shall be decided? 
The Senator from Michigan, [Mr. Stuakt,] who 
held the chair during your absence, sir, thought 
it must be left to decide itself by being forgotten. 
Other Senators have said the same thiug. Is that 
a just and right way to settle and decide it? Cer- 
tainly not, if this Congress has jurisdiction and 
authority to hear and decide the complaints of 
the people of Kansas. Who, then, has power 
to decide this appeal? Is it the President of the 
United States? No, sir; he is only an executive 
officer. He may decide piima facie, provisionally, 
conditionally, for his own immediate action, lie 
has assumed, as we understand, to do so, but his 
decision is not conclusive upon the legislative 
authority or upon the courts of justice. 

There is legislative authority, and there is judi- 
cial authority, in this land. The Senator from 
Connecticut [Mr. Toucey] tells us the courts have 
the power. Sir, it is a question, not as he seems 
to imply, between man and man in the Territory 
of Kansas, between individual and individual, 
citizen and citizen, but it is a question of the 
safety, peace, order, and tranquillity, of the whole 
body politic, and of the very existence of civil 
liberty in Kansas. What court in Kansas can 
reader a judgment that will reach the extent of 
the evil, and att'ord a redress, if one is due? 
What court in Kansas can award a seat in the 
House of Representatives to the delegate of the 
people of Kansas, or deny to the Territorial 
representative his place there? What court can 
award a judgment that shall give unquestionable 
validity and effect to the acts of taxation and 
force of this assumed Territorial Legislature in 
Kansas ? 

The Legislature of Kansas cannot do this, 
because it is itself a party to the controversy. 
Where, then, is the power? It is in the Congress 
of the United'States, which has absolute and un- 
bounded control over the whole Government of 
Kansas, in all its departments, executive, legisla- 
tive, and judicial, and which has, I had almost 
said, equal control over the Executive Depart- 
ment of the United States itself, as, indeed, it has 
in regard to this particular subject. Congress has 
only to breathe upon the statute-book whith is 
questioned by those whom you call rebels in Kan- 
sas, and it starts up into life, and vigor, and au- 
thority, and power. It has only to lay its hand 
of condemnation upon that statute-book, and the 
laws disappear into that pit of perdition to which 
tyranny should and ultimately must always de- 
scend. 

In the mean time, while we here are occupying 
our time in everything else, and in debates, some- 
times calm and sometimes stormy, on this great 
question, whether the professed Territorial Gov- 
ernment of Kansas is really a Government of the 
United States ; and while the House of Repre- 
sentatives are engaged on that same question, 
taking evidence upou it, and having a day set 



8 



down not a fortnight hence for its consideration, 
this, simple proposition of the Senator from Ken- 
tucky is submitted, which provides that the Sen- 
ate of the United States, desirous to mitigate 
these evils and these enormities, and, as far as 
possible, to preserve peace in the Territory of 
Kansas during the time while this debate shall 
last, suggests to the President of the United States 
that it would be wise, in their judgment, for him 
to invest with the command of the forces already 
actuality in Kansas, the distinguished, the illus- 
trious. Lieutenant General of the United States 
Army, the conqueror of ilexico, and the pacifica- 
tor in many domestic and foreign strifes and wars. 
What earthly objection can there be to such a 
course? Suppose that it is not wise, and the 
President shall not accept the advice, then the 
command will remain where it is. Suppose it 
is M'ise, and the President shall accept it, is there 
any mortal man, whatever may be his confidence 
in Colonel Sumner, who is not conscientiously 
obliged to confess equal confidence in Winfield 
Scott? 

Is there nothing in the prestige, in the fame, in 
the eminent patriotism, and eminent loyalty, and 
eminent devotion to peace, of this the greatest of 
our captains, which Mill persuade men to wait, 
to be calm, to subdue their passions, to abide by 
the justice of Congress during the short time in 
which the subject is to be discussed? 

What is the objection actually urged ? Why, 
sir, it is that we may not undertake to dictate to 
the President of the United States ; we may not 
express our opinion about a matter which falls 
within his exclusive province ! Sir, this is a fear- i 
ful sign of a change of temper and of spirit in re- 
.gard to the proper division of powers in this Gov- 
ernment. The President is, indeed, the Executive, 
but Congress is the Legislature. He is but the 
hand ; except where the Constitution has given 
him exclusive jurisdiction, if there be any such 
case, we have only to take that hand, and set it 
at any hour on the dial plate, and it must stand 
there. We have only to set the Executive needle 
in motion towards any point of the compass, and 
it must go on until it reaches that point. It can- 
not traverse backwards or forwards beyond that 
point. In the British Parliament, which we are 
apt to think is less conservative of the rights of the 
people than Congress, a i-esolution may be intro- 
duced by any member of the House of Lords or 
of the House of Commons, and the House be 
o called to vote upon it, that the Slinistry have not 
the confidence of the Parliament; and if it be 
adopted, it is conclusive of an entire change of 
administration, or if it be decided otherwise, it is 
a vote of approbation, which renews the execu- 
tive power. Have we not a right to express our 
opinion by way of instruction or guidance to the 
President of the United States ? I think we have 
a right even to pass a vote of censure, if such 
were needed. This resolution, however, is not of 
that character. It assumes nothing against the 
President. On the other hand, as it is drawn, 



im-f 



differing from my views on the subject, it 

plies confidence in the President, and a desirt to 
support him in the present questionable exercise 
of his high authority. 

There is fear, sir, that we may undervalue the 
danger of this crisis. The Senator from Florida 
tells us, as the Senator from Connecticut does 
that it is only necessary that the people of Kan- 
sas shall obey the laws; and if they will not obey 
the laws, the sheriff and the judge, backed by 
the armed posse under the direction of the Gov- 
ernment, will compel their obedience. Never 
throughout all this debate, do they for one mo- 
ment admit, or advert to, the fact, 'that this diso- 
bedience of which they complain results, not 
fi-om disloyalty to the Government of the United 
States, but irom loyalty to the Constitution of 
the United States, and the principles of civil lib- 
erty which it guaranties. Kever, for one moment, 
do they admit that the people who object to the 
authority of those laws, and refuse to obey or ac- 
knowledge them, deny that they were represented 
in the Legislature which made them, and say that 
it was a usurping Legislature. If that be true — 
and in this argument I am not going to discuss 
the question whether it be true or not — but, if 
that be the ground they assume, and if it is as-' 
sumed by a party sufficiently strong and numer- 
ous to indicate that it is the opinion of a majority 
of the people of that Territory, then you have got 
to the point when you expect to subjugate men 
as rebels, and as traitors, who are defending 
themselves as patriots, citizens, and as freemen. 

This question is not factitiously raised, nor 
factiously debated amongst them; nor is it a 
question so easy and certain of solution as hon- 
orable Senators seem to think. It divides this 
nation, just as it divides Congress. On the north 
side of the Capitol of the United States, (the Sen- 
ate Chamber,) the laws of Kansas are held to be 
valid, obligatory, supreme — the law of the land. 
On the south side of the Capitol of the United 
States, (the House of Representatives,) those laws 
are held to constitute a tyranny, a fraud, a des- 
potism, founded in usurpation. It is just so 
throughout the Union, reversing the points of 
the compass. South of the Potomac, the laws of 
Kansas are just, humane, merciful, constitution- 
al; and it is treason to disobey them. North of 
the Potomac — if you do not know it now, you will 
know it soon — those laws are held and will be 
held to be unjust, tyrannical, unworthy of obedi- 
ence, and the people who submit to them un- 
worthy to be the brethren of the free people of 
the States of the American Union. 

To arrest this conflict of arras, to settle this 
question under the forms of the Constitution, has 
been my earnest object, and it will continue to 
be. To soothe and quiet the public mind, to 
arrest the increasing danger of civil war, is the 
simple object of this resolution. Therefore, with 
the reservation which I have before made, I give 
ray vote for taking it up, and shall give my vote 
for its adoption. 



PUBLISHED BY THE REPUBLICAN ASSOCIATION OF WASHINGTON. 
BuELL & Blancoard, Printeks. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




